If you ask kindergartners at South Butler County Primary School where milk comes from, they likely won't say the store.

In a district where some students live on farms and many ride school buses past farms, students in the classroom of Susan Sande have been taking a look at farm life from all directions for the past few weeks.

They have sung farm songs -- well beyond the standard "Old MacDonald" -- and talked about food raised on farms, gone on a virtual farm tour on the Internet and learned the names of animal babies.

On the hallway wall, they posted a large farm, with cows, pigs, chickens and other animals. Beneath the animals, they have put in order a 19-step process of making milk, beginning with the birth of a calf and ending with the production of cheese, ice cream and yogurt.

So it was only fitting that last week on Dairy Day, the children got a chance to "milk" a cow. Mrs. Sande made a paper black-and-white cow, with an udder made of a latex-free glove filled with white tempera paint, an idea Mrs. Sande found on the Internet.

The cow -- a Holstein, the most popular dairy cow -- wasn't quite as tall as the kindergartners, but sitting on a stool, the children were at just the right height for milking. Tiny holes pricked in each fingertip allowed the paint to escape when the glove's fingers were squeezed, and Mrs. Sande held a large sheet of black construction paper underneath so that each child could make a splatter painting. And, unlike the real thing, there was no risk this cow would kick.

Some children considered the squeezing easy, and others called it hard.

Brayden Hageter, who has milked a real cow, pronounced the fake one easier to milk.

For the milking, Mrs. Sande divided the 20 students into four groups which rotated from learning center to learning center.

While some donned ponchos so they could milk the cow, another group sampled dairy products -- cheddar and Monterey jack cheese; milk; and strawberry and cherry yogurt. Most drew smiley faces showing their reviews. A third group read animal books while a fourth drew pictures of farms and farm products.

Future lessons include choosing a favorite farm animal and graphing which ones are the most popular among the class as well as making ice cream.

While this activity involved both Mrs. Sande's morning and afternoon half-day kindergarten classes, South Butler County has a variety of activities at various grade levels to help make children aware of farms, animals and plants.

South Butler High School has an agriculture science class, and some of its students occasionally read to the primary school students. It also has a chapter of the FFA, formerly known as the Future Farmers of America. Three teachers from the primary school, which serves grades K-3, have attended agriculture conferences at Penn State. Students plant a flower garden in the back, sometimes with help from the high school students.

Primary school classes also have used materials produced by the state Department of Agriculture, including the Milk Can Project, which circulates milk cans filled with lesson plans focusing on the dairy industry.

Primary school Principal Greg Hajek noted farms are located in all of the municipalities of the district, Clinton, Jefferson, Penn and Winfield townships and Saxonburg Borough. Overall, Butler County has 1,116 farms, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Dairy Day's cow got high reviews from kindergartner Gabe Webb.

After milking the cow, he said, "It was awesome."